A great idea is often as simple as A-B-C. Seaside United Methodist Church (UMC) had to go no further than “Be” to find theirs.
The seaside town of Sunset Beach in Brunswick County sits in the southernmost corner of North Carolina. The relaxed and quiet world of southern coastal living has made it a haven for retirees and one of the state’s fastest-growing areas. But U.S. Highway 17 is a divide between fashionable retirement communities and the 13 percent of the population living below the poverty line.
“There is a great need in Brunswick County for community outreach,” said Mary Ellen Good, Seaside UMC’s director of communications. “Our church is committed to serving our entire community. We are going into our 12th year of a summer literacy program funded by The Duke Endowment.
“When I saw information about the Connect Church program cross my desk I thought, ‘This is a great opportunity to work together to sort of flush out where we could continue to make a difference in our county using the assets of the church.’”
Making the Transition
With the assistance of the NC Rural Center’s Faith in Rural Communities Connect Church program, the “Be” Program was developed to assist sixth-grade students transitioning from elementary school to middle school.
Good said when entering the Connect program, the 10-person church team was unaware what opportunity might best serve the community.
“The program was extremely well organized and explained. I personally liked the booklet. If you follow the steps logically, you get to a point where you can narrow down where your focus is going to be,” she explained.
“All you have to do is follow the process. This is an excellent exercise in taking a look at our church, our community, and how the two can come together.”
With original curriculum developed by Seaside’s Connect Church team, the “Be” Program is based on four tenets: Be a Friend, Be a Learner, Be a Citizen, and Be Yourself. More than 20 church members volunteer to teach the program once a month to 180 sixth-grade students at Shallotte Middle School.
“The Seaside United Methodist Church Connect Church team consulted with our two local elementary schools and Shallotte Middle School to implement a transitional initiative we call the “Be” Program,” said the church’s director of discipleship ministries Neil Crowell. “It is designed to provide consistent guidance and support to the school’s sixth-grade students during the often tenuous transition.”
Six months into the yearlong Connect Church program, the Seaside UMC team couldn’t settle on a project to adequately serve its community.
“We had thrown a lot of ideas against the wall but nothing stuck,” Crowell said. “Our lead pastor Matt Farabow said we need to do something with schools.”
It was then that Connect team member Ron Sorice threw out an idea that worked.
“We were sitting around a table talking about the requirements and direction of our focus, and we ended up with education,” he said. “A lot’s been talked about in Brunswick County about education, especially as you go across Route 17. There’s a distinct split here we’re aware exists. The beach side of 17 and the rural side of 17. It’s the rural side of 17 where there is a big concern about the kids getting the proper education needed.”
Transitioning from elementary to middle school is a critical step in a child’s education.
“Fifth-graders have been dependent upon friends and classmates for five years,” Sorice noted. “They’ve become very comfortable with the same group, and now they’re being thrown into an environment where they may not know the people standing next to them.
“It’s all about getting to know new people, getting to become acquainted with their habits, and becoming associated with different teachers. They’ve got to become acclimated to a totally new environment.”
Overcoming Obstacles
The church faced several other challenges after identifying education as its focus.
Originally designed to be taught to fifth-graders in their last semester in elementary school, logistics forced the team to pivot to sixth-graders in their first semester in middle school.
They reached out to Shallotte Middle School’s principal Michael Hobbs, as well as the Brunswick County School Board and the county superintendent, to share the idea about the program and gauge their reactions.
“Principal Hobbs was one of our first program supporters,” said Crowell. “The school board expressed concern whether a faith-based organization could successfully teach a nonfaith-based curriculum in the classroom.”
Enter Lori Sefcik. Not a member of the Seaside Connect Church team, she had been a volunteer teaching vacation bible school at the church.
“I mentioned I used to teach middle school,” said Sefcik, now the program’s lead teacher. “It was then someone took me to Neil’s office. It was kind of like being taken to the principal’s office. Neil went over the program the Connect Church committee had been working on and asked me if I would like to help.”
She explained that the Connect team already had a plan. “I had their goals and objectives for the four values they wanted presented. Looking at it as kind of a puzzle, I took that and came up with a lesson for each of them. Taking the pieces and weaving them into one complete picture.”
The picture turned out to be a one-of-a-kind, secular curriculum that would be taught over a four-month period during the sixth-graders first semester in middle school.
With plenty of volunteers, a program in hand and approvals from the school system, the Connect Church team was ready to begin teaching when the school doors opened in September. Enter the State of North Carolina to throw a roadblock into their path.
Finding Options
The “Be” Program was originally meant to be taught to students during their free period. The state changed rules for that hour, however. Any educational-based program had to approved by the State of North Carolina.
“There was no way we were going to get approval of our program by the state before the start of school,” said Crowell. “What we thought we were going to be doing at 11 o’clock we had to change before the clock struck twelve.”
The school gave the team some options. Crowell felt an after-school session would never work. It was school counselor Stephanie Paglia and Principal Hobbs who came up with a solution. Passing the program through the health-initiative class where school teachers would supervise, but the church’s team would be presenting the material.
“What we learned in Connect Church is there are times you think things are going well, and times you have to take a step back and reassess where you are. It was this process that helped us gather the insight to bypass the roadblock,” Crowell said.
Working Through Problems
The “Be” Program taught the church team a lot about adaptability. They admit there were a lot of phone calls to their NC Rural Center coach Darren Crotts when they became stuck.
“Darren kept reassuring us don’t worry about being stuck, just work your way through it,” Crowell recalled. “As frustrated as we were, that is the core of what we learned through the whole process.”
Entering the third month of the program, both Principal Hobbs and Ms. Paglia have found the sixth-graders are very engaged in the program.
“I have to give a lot of credit to Ms. Lori,” said Paglia. “She is a great facilitator of the program and her approach keeps kids engaged. “We are seeing a lot less disciplinary issues. They are participating and paying attention. Lessons are very appropriate and timed well for the 42 minutes we have in each section.”
Working with a class of 30 students, kids are seated by a random draw of a straw and work together in groups that include hands-on activities.
“Sixth-graders left elementary school as the top dog and come in low on the totem pole at middle school,” said Principal Hobbs. “There’s a lot of fears and unknown myths.
“This program has already made a big impact on our current class. Last year, we had a lot of bullying situations going on within the sixth-grade class. This year, our sixth-grade has none of that happening.”